Here’s some more revealing pics of Erick Scarecrow’s grayscale colorway of Soopa Maria that I posted a sneak peek of earlier this week.

Erick Scarecrow’s Soopa Maria Sato character — clearly an homage to Super Mario Bros. 3 — is my absolute favorite among his figures by far and it would be a huge understatement to say that this new grayscale colorway makes me just a bit giddy.

This whopping 18″ figure is limited to a mere 10 pieces worldwide and will be available exclusively from the Japanese toy retailer Tomenosuke on Thursday, November 26th at 12am midnight JST.

Kaaanedaaa!!!

Can you believe that the classic anime Akira is over 20 years old!?

Produced by Sideshow Toy, this Die-Cast replica of Kaneda’s bike from Katsuhiro Otomo’s  groundbreaking manga and anime feature is just over 6 inches tall and nearly 20 freaking inches long!

When it comes to awesomenss of this magnitude, shelf space will be the least of your worries when you hear about the insane $420 price tag. You can currently pre-order it from BigBadToyStore.com for $375 and you can expect it to ship some time in January of 2010. You might wanna’ start saving your monies, like, six months ago…

Someone should invent light-trailing technology just for this thing.

[Via Fanboy]

Jamungo has finally unleashed their 3rd series of BUDs upon the unsuspecting masses! In what can only be described as their most diverse and striking series yet, each figure comes blindboxed and retails for $9.99.

The lineup of artists for this series consists of MAD, Jesse Ledoux, Yuck, Jon Burgerman, FERG, Superdeux, Aesthetic Apparatus, VanBeater, Pedini, Kenn Munk, Sauerkids, Jim Koch, Frank Kozik, oooOOOooo (Brian Morris), and Muttpop.

My absolute favorite is the little Crappycat by VanBeater:

Here’s some more by MAD, Jon Burgerman, and Jim Coch, in that order:

Check out jamungo.com for more details and a list of retailers.

Erick Scarecrow’s Soopa Maria Sato character — clearly an homage to Super Mario Bros. 3 — is my absolute favorite among his figures by far and it would be a huge understatement to say that this new grayscale colorway makes me just a bit giddy.

This whopping 18″ figure is limited to a mere 10 pieces worldwide and will be available exclusively from the Japanese toy retailer Tomenosuke on Thursday, November 26th at 12am midnight JST.

Revoltech, the line of meticulously articulated, heavily detailed Japanese figures recently held their Revoltech Expo and unveiled a butt-load of new figures as well as some surprising new licenses featuring popular characters from American franchises like Batman, Alien, Jurassic Park, and Nightmare Before Christmas.

While I thought the Batman Revoltech looked kinda’ lame and I could care less about an Alien Revoltech or a Revoltech of the T-Rex from Jurassic Park (although the T-Rex is pretty badass lookin’), the Jack Skellington figure stole my heart and gave it a boner. I also love how they’ve replaced the standard plain Revoltech bases with more fitting stands that better suit each character.

Check out pics of the figures previously mentioned and more at Tokyo Hunter.

Erick Scarecrow just dropped the above teaser image in my inbox. What could it mean?

Each year Kidrobot releases a 3″ holiday-themed Dunny and this year they’ve turned to U.K. design duo TADO for what can only be described as one of the most endearingly sarcastic holiday Dunnys so far.

I’m willing to go out on a limb and say that this is not only the best Dunny release of 2009, but it’s easily one of the greatest of all time.

I’m just wondering what’s under the beard. And since this is Kidrobot we’re talking about, it’s safe to say you can probably expect a chase variant or two.

The back of this piece provides a pleasant warning that Christmas will beat the living shit out of you with a baseball bat and steal your money.

Krunk-A-Claus is currently available at Kidrobot.com and select retailers.

[Via KRonikle]

[Via Metro Centric]

I’ve featured countless custom designer toys and custom console mods on Albotas throughout the years, but these custom NES systems by Thretris (spotted on Tiny Cartridge) are the first I’ve seen that have sort of a designer toy aesthetic. The polish and level of professional quality on these are amazing.

The line between toy customizing and console modding is just a bit more blurry.

This is the Killtendo Entertainment System (KES) and is a companion to another Thretris custom, the Billtendo Killboy

Dubbed Sky, all I can think of when I look at this one is Mega Man.

This one’s called 80’s Reborn, which I can kind of see, but this one gives off the biggest designer toy vibe.

And since we’re on the topic of custom NES consoles, check out this red velvet NES by Phil McCoy and sexy-ass Battletoads NES by Phil’s friend Greg which were also featured on Tiny Cartridge:

Possibly one of the best NES mods ever.

These adorable USB gadgets not only look like knockoffs of Tokidoki characters, but they also warm up your hands and make great massagers.

And ladies, if your hands don’t need warming or massaging, you can always use your vaginas.

They also come in an array of fruity flavors, but no peach, which is a shame. I could eat a peach for hours.

Vagina.

Big thanks to Jenny, who may or may not be using one of these things as a masturbatory aid, for sending this in!

Imagine you find yourself somewhere in Middle Earth from J.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings books, only your tripping balls off shrooms and extacy. You’d probably experience something close to Order of the Arcane, a new series of custom designer toys by Josh (f+) Pierce.

Order of the Arcane is set in a world of fantasy and lost Majik. Think of it as Hellboy meets urban vinyl meets just plain trippy and awesome.

Pierce will unveil his collection at Red Hot Robot in Phoenix, AZ from 7pm – 10pm tonight, November 13th.

If you can’t make it to the show yourself, you can check out each custom in the a huge gallery past the jump. These are hands down some of the sickest customs I’ve seen, so do yourself the favor and check out some picks that will rock your face without mercy and inspire the living shit out of your brain. More »

I get a buttload of emails each week from artists asking me to feature their latest custom toys on the site. Sometimes the submissions are kind of stinky. Sometimes they’re just “meh.”

And Sometimes they sort of blow my mind, like this one.

Aaron Boy is an up and coming artist from Phoenix, Arizona and he recently completed a 10″ Teddy Troop figure that he’s named Baxter the Lonely Dead Bear. This figure’s already been featured on the official Teddy Troops website and it’s easy to see why. His work sort of gives off a Greg “Craola” Simkins/Brent Nolasco vibe, but it manages to stay fresh without seeming copycat-ish.

I highly recommend checking out Aaron Boy’s blog for more of his work. I have a feeling that if he keeps at it, he’ll be a shining star in the designer toy/urban art world in no time.

Seriously, look out for this kid.

Wizard Sleeve Toys and SpankyStokes.com will be releasing the limited edition, purple-drippy-nighttime WST Celsius figure at this year’s DesignerCon on November 21st in Pasadena. Packaged with an arsenal of weaponry, this 7″ figure by Robotox and Kuso Vinyl is limited to just 48 pieces and you can only get it from the SpankyStokes.com booth #35 for $100.

These are actual licensed replicas of the EVE power-ups from Bioshock and they’re available exclusively from Play.com for £13.99 ($23 USD). I wonder if they come with a warning label for idiots who try to inject themselves with these hoping to obtain super powers.

[Via Nerd Approved]

Dear Erick Scarecrow,

I really like your work. Lots of us do. But please — pretty please — release something in higher quantities so that some of your U.S. fans can get in on the action. Our toy shelves are cryin’ out for more Erick Scarecrow awesomeness.

Here’s the latest from the ESC-TOY, LTD. newsletter:

Straight from Vince’s Toy Studio in Taiwan is the new exclusive…Ice Cream Micci Chocolate & Chocolate Sprinkles on Vanilla Cone by Erick Scarecrow. The 6″ handpainted resin figure is signed/numbered by the artist and comes sealed in Scarecrow’s box. The edition size is limited to 25pcs. worldwide and will be sold on a first come first serve basis. Please contact vtsstoys@gmail.com for all international orders.

There’s also an interesting post on Erick Scarecrow’s blog explaining why he’s doing all these dessert-themed Mousey Micci figures. It turns out, he has a bit of a sweet tooth and draws some of his inspiration from a past job working at a ice cream shop. Check out the full post here.

I’m gonna’ go out on a limb and say this is my favorite Micci figure thus far. I love the little angry chocolate eyebrows. I’d totally be down for a 3″ Mousey Micci blindboxed set. Anyone else?